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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22848988">Leeway</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/DPPatricks/pseuds/DPPatricks'>DPPatricks</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Starsky &amp; Hutch</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Episode Related, Gen, Partnership, spiratulism</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-02-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-02-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-04-28 17:34:10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>954</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22848988</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/DPPatricks/pseuds/DPPatricks</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>A mostly-silent conversation between a trapped Hutch and an... unseen but powerful presence.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Ken Hutchinson/David Starsky</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>25</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Leeway</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This is the second of my 'mystical/spiritual' stories. It's not AU and, despite what the first paragraph indicates, it is NOT a death fic. Please, read on.<br/>Initially posted on the Starsky&amp;Hutch911 livejournal site on March 24, 2016, in honor of Starsky/PMG's birthday that year: I figured the most precious gift Starsky could want would be finding Hutch.<br/>Edited for this cross-posting.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>My breath slips away and, suddenly, miraculously, there’s no more pain. No agony in my leg, no crushing ache in my head, no sandpaper in my throat or tightness in my chest. There’s no discomfort at all. I know I’m finally dead.</p><p>
  <i>Oh, Starsk, I’m so sorry. I tried to hold on. I swear I did. I didn’t want you to find me like this. I wanted to be waiting for you. But I was so tired. And I hurt so badly. I’m sorry.</i>
</p><p>Is that a car? Oh, shit, it is! There’s a car up there. A door slams. <i>Why couldn’t I have held on just a few minutes longer? Why?</i></p><p>Another car! I know that sound, it’s the Torino. Starsky’s here! <i>Oh, God, why couldn’t You have let me wait for him?</i></p><p>Running, pounding footsteps careen down the hillside. There’s the sound of a brief scuffle, followed by rocks and gravel hitting the car and continuing past, into the canyon.</p><p>“Hutch!” More rocks and dust and the sounds of sliding. “Huutchhhhhhhh!”</p><p>His body shudders to a stop next to mine. His hands hesitate, most likely from fear, uncertainty, before cradling my head. “Hutch.”</p><p>I’ve heard it said that time ceases to have meaning when you die and I think it must be true because Starsky doesn’t move for the longest time. When he does though, it takes me by surprise. He throws his head back and screams, “No! Hutch, no. You can’t be dead. You just can’t be dead.”</p><p>He puts his forehead against mine, tears streaming onto my face. “Come back to me. Please, Hutch. Please come back.” He lifts up and looks down at me. His fingers caress my cheeks. “You’re still warm. You’re not gone yet. You’re here.” He looks around wildly. “I can feel you, partner. I know you can hear me. Come back. Please! Don’t leave me!”</p><p>I feel a presence. I have no idea who, or what it is, but my sense tells me it’s a source of help. <i>Can I go back?</i> I silently ask. <i>Please? He won’t make it otherwise. Not if I died minutes before he found me. It would kill him.</i><br/>
</p><p><i>You’re right,</i> the presence answers. <i>It wasn’t meant to happen like this anyway.</i></p><p><i>What do you mean?</i>
</p><p>Starsky’s crying again, his face next to mine. “I’ve been looking for you, Hutch, I never stopped. But I missed it completely with Sonny. He came to the precinct and I wouldn’t listen. I wouldn’t hear what he was trying to tell me. I’d have found you sooner if only I’d listened!”</p><p><i>Sonny was always a last resort,</i> the comforting source says. <i>Your partner was supposed to confront Roy Slater yesterday and discover where you were.</i></p><p>
  <i>What happened?</i>
</p><p>
  <i>Unfortunately, Slater followed a darker group of angels. Ones with no compassion whatsoever. They let him fall.</i>
</p><p><i>So my partner lost the chance to find me.</i> I know I shouldn’t be getting angry, but I am. <i>Couldn’t you have done something else? You say it wasn’t supposed to happen this way! I was supposed to be alive when Starsky got here. Right?<i></i></i></p><p>
  <i>Correct. And we did do something. We directed him to a boy who had heard your radio calls. He sent Dave back to Sonny.</i> If a presence could shrug its shoulders, this one did. <i>Too late though.</i>
  
</p><p>
  <i>Why? I’m still here. I haven’t gone anywhere. I could slip back into my body right now, I’ll bet. All you have to do is let me.</i> I tried to look around, to find something at which to direct my fury. <i>You can’t do this to him just because I was weak. He’s a good man, he’s the best cop I’ve ever known. You’ll destroy him if you do this.</i>
  
</p><p>
  <i>
    <i>I think I hear, or imagine I can hear quiet conversation, not a word of which do I understand.</i>
  </i>
</p><p>
      <i>Go.</i>
    
  
</p><p>
  <i>
    <i>I hear the word in my soul, slip into my body, and draw a shallow breath.</i>
  </i>
</p><p>
  <i>
    <i>Starsky gasps and sits up, tightening his hands on my face. “Hutch?”</i>
  </i>
</p><p>
  <i>
    <i>I do my best to smile but it probably isn’t very successful. “Knew you’d find me.”</i>
  </i>
</p><p>
  <i>
    <i>“I thought you were dead…. I thought I was too late.”</i>
  </i>
</p><p>
  <i>
    <i>“Lots to talk about,” I manage to get out my parched throat. “Later though, okay?”</i>
  </i>
</p><p>
  <i>
    <i>He bolts upright. “Right! I’ll let Dobey know exactly where we are, bring you some water.” He starts to get up, then sinks back down. “You won’t go anywhere before I get back, will ya?”</i>
  </i>
</p><p>
  <i>
    <i>“I’ll wait right here.”</i>
  </i>
</p><p>
  <i>
    <i>He bends and kisses my forehead. “Thanks for coming back.”</i>
  </i>
</p><p>
  <i>
    <i>“I had help.”</i>
  </i>
</p><p>
  <i>
    <i>“Tell me later.” He’s gone in a scrabble of rocks and dust.</i>
  </i>
</p><p>
  <i>That’s some partner you’ve got there, Ken,</i> the presence says, and I think a wing shades me from the burning sun.


 </p><p><i>You don’t know the half of it.</i>
    
  
</p><p>
  <b></b>
</p><p>
  <b></b>
</p><p><i>Oh, I think we do.</i> The reply sounds as if the voice is smiling.</p><p>
      <i>You saved us both for something, didn’t you?</i>
    
  
</p><p>
      <i>For many things, son. For a great many things.</i>
    
  
</p><p>
  <i>Why, though? How?</i> Since I was getting my questions answered, I might as well press my luck.
  
</p><p>I hear a dry chuckle. <i>Reasons, now, Hutchinson?</i>
  
</p><p>
  <i>Well, yeah.</i>
</p><p>
  <i>
    <i>I swear the wing lightly brushes my cheek.</i>
  </i>
</p><p>
  <i>We have some leeway, when things don’t turn out the way they were supposed to.</i>
</p><p><i>Thank you,</i> I say, as sincerely as I’d ever said anything in my life.
  
</p><p><i>You’re welcome.</i>
    
  
</p><p>
  <i>
    <i>I know it’s okay to sleep for a few minutes, until Starsky can get back to me with some water, and help. I’m not going to die again. At least not now. Not here. And I say a second <i>thank you</i> for that. “We made it partner.”
  </i>
</i></p><p>
  <i></i>
</p><p>
  <i></i>
</p><p>
  <i>
    
  </i>
</p><p>
  <i>
    <i>END</i>
  </i>
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